CHAPTER II

Much to Sally's surprise, Fox came on and he brought Henrietta.

"Doctor Sanderson's engagements cannot be very pressing," she said to him, smiling, as she gave him her hand, "to permit of his coming several hundred miles merely to see two lone women."

Now Doctor Sanderson's engagements, as it chanced, were rather pressing; and it was a fair inference from Sally's words that she was not as glad to see him as he wished and had hoped. But her smile belied her words.

"Miss Ladue forgets, perhaps," he replied, bowing rather formally, "that most of our patients are women, lone or otherwise, and that it is all in the way of business to travel several hundred miles to see them--and to charge for it. Although there are not many that I would take that trouble for," he added, under his breath. "So look out, Sally," he concluded gayly, "and wait until our bill comes in."

That sobered Sally. "Oh, Fox," she said, "we owe you enough already." Which was not what he had bargained for. Sally was looking at him thoughtfully and seemed to be calculating. "Perhaps," she began, "I could manage to--"

"Sally," he interrupted hastily--he seemed even fierce about it--"Sally, I'd like to shake you."

Sally laughed suddenly. "Why don't you?" she asked. "I've no doubt it would do me good."

"That's better," Fox went on, with evident satisfaction. "You seem to be coming to your senses." Sally laughed again. "That's still better. Now, aren't you glad to see me?"

"Why, of course I am."

"Then, why didn't you say so?" he challenged. "Merely to gratify my curiosity, tell me why you didn't."

"Why didn't you?" Sally retorted, still chuckling a little.

Fox looked blank. "Didn't I? Is it possible that I omitted to state such an obvious truth?"

Sally nodded. She was looking past him. "Oh," she cried quickly, "there's Henrietta."

"Another obvious truth," he murmured, more to himself than to Sally. "There's Henrietta."

Henrietta came quickly forward; indeed, she was running. And Sally met her. Sally was quick enough, but she seemed slow in comparison with Henrietta.

"Sally, dear!" exclaimed Henrietta, kissing her on both cheeks. "How glad I am to see you! You can't imagine." Which was a statement without warrant of fact. If there was one thing that Sally could do better than another, it was to imagine. "Come up with me and show me my room. I've an ocean of things to say to you. Fox will excuse us, I know."

"Fox will have to, I suppose," he said, "whether he wants to or not."

"You see," laughed Henrietta, "he knows his place."

"Oh, yes," Fox agreed. "I know my place."

Sally had not seen Henrietta for four or five years. Henrietta was a lively girl, small and dainty and very pretty. Her very motions were like those of a butterfly, fluttering with no apparent aim and then alighting suddenly and with great accuracy upon the very flower whose sweetness she had meant, all along, to capture; but lightly and for a moment. The simile is Sally's, not mine, and she thought of it at the instant of greeting her; in fact, it was while Henrietta was kissing her, and she could not help wondering whether Henrietta--But there she stopped, resolutely. Such thoughts were uncharitable.

In spite of Sally's wonderings, she was captivated by Henrietta's daintiness and beauty. Sally never thought at all about her own looks, although they deserved more than a thought; for--well, one might have asked Jane Spencer or Richard Torrington, or even Fox, who had just seen her for the first time in years. Or Everett Morton might have been prevailed upon to give an opinion, although Everett's opinion would have counted for little. He would have appraised her good points as he would have appraised those of a horse or a dog; he might even have compared her with his favorite horse, Sawny,--possibly to the disadvantage of Sawny, although there is more doubt about that than there should be,--or to his last year's car. But he was driving Sawny now more than he was driving his car, for there was racing every afternoon on the Cow Path by the members of the Gentlemen's Driving Club. No, on the whole, I should not have advised going to Everett.

Sally, I say, not being vain or given to thinking about her own looks, thought Henrietta was the prettiest thing she had ever seen. So, when Henrietta issued the command which has been recorded, Sally went without a word of protest, leaving Fox and her mother standing in the back parlor beside the table with its ancient stained and cut green cloth. Fox was not looking at her, but at the doorway through which Sally had just vanished.

"Well," he said at last, turning to her, "I call that rather a cold sort of a greeting, after four years."

Mrs. Ladue laughed softly. "What should she have done, you great boy?" she asked. "Should she have fallen upon your neck and kissed you?"

"Why, yes," Fox replied, "something of the sort. I shouldn't have minded. I think it might have been rather nice. But I suppose it might be a hard thing to do."

"Fox," she protested, "you are wrong about Sally. She isn't cold at all, not at all. She is as glad to see you as I am--almost. And I am glad."

"That is something to be grateful for, dear lady," he said. "I would not have you think that I am not grateful--very grateful. It is one of the blessings showered upon me by a very heedless providence," he continued, smiling, "unmindful of my deserts."

"Oh, Fox!" she protested. "Your deserts! If you had--"

He interrupted gently. "I know. The earth ought to be laid at my feet. I know what you think and I am grateful for that, too."

To this there was no reply.

"I think," he resumed reflectively, "that enough of the earth is laid at my feet, as it is. I shall not be thirty until next fall." He spoke with a note of triumph, which can easily be forgiven.

"And I," she said, "am forty-three. Look at my gray hairs."

He laughed. "Who would believe it? But what," he asked, "was the special reason for your wanting to see me now? I take it there was a special reason?"

She shook her head. "There wasn't any _special_ reason. I meant to make that plain and I thought I had. I feel as if I ought to apologize for asking you at all, for you may have felt under some obligation to come just because you were asked. I hope you didn't, Fox, for--"

Fox smiled quietly. His smile made her think of Uncle John Hazen. "I didn't," he said.

"I'm glad you didn't. Don't ever feel obliged to do anything for me--for us." She corrected herself quickly. "We are grateful, too,--at least, I am--for anything. No, there wasn't any special reason. I just wanted to see you with my own eyes. Four years is a long time."

Fox, who had almost reached the advanced age of thirty, was plainly embarrassed.

"Well," he asked, laughing a little, "now that you have seen me, what do you think?"

"That," she answered, still in her tone of gentle banter, "I shall not tell you. It would not be good for you." A step was heard in the hall. "Oh," she added, hastily, in a voice that was scarcely more than a whisper, "here's Patty. Be nice to her, Fox."

However much--or little--Mrs. Ladue's command had to do with it, Fox was as nice to Patty as he knew how to be. To be sure, Fox had had much experience with just Patty's kind in the past four years, and he had learned just the manner for her. It was involuntary on his part, to a great extent, and poor Patty beamed and fluttered and was very gracious. She even suggested something that she had had no expectation of suggesting when she entered the room.

"Perhaps, Mr. Sanderson," she said, with a slight inclination of her head, "you would care to accompany us out on the harbor to-morrow afternoon. It is frozen over, you know, and the ice is very thick. There is no danger, I assure you. It doesn't happen every winter and we make the most of it." She laughed a little, lightly. "The men--the young men--race their horses there every afternoon. They usually race on the Cow Path--Washington Street, no doubt I should call it, but we still cling to the old names, among ourselves. These young men have taken advantage of the unusual condition of the harbor and it is a very pretty sight; all those horses flying along. We shall not race, of course."

If Sally had heard her, I doubt whether she would have been able to suppress her chuckles at the idea of the Hazens' stout horse--the identical horse that had drawn her on her first arrival--at the idea, I say, of that plethoric and phlegmatic and somewhat aged animal's competing with such a horse as Sawny, for example. Mrs. Ladue had some difficulty in doing no more than smile.

"Why, Patty," she began, in amazement, "were you--but I must not keep Fox from answering."

Patty had betrayed some uneasiness when Mrs. Ladue began to speak, which is not to be wondered at. She quieted down.

"I ought to have called you Doctor Sanderson," she observed, "ought I not? I forgot, for the moment, the celebrity to which you have attained." Again she inclined her head slightly.

Fox laughed easily. "Call me anything you like," he replied. "As to going with you to see the races, I accept with much pleasure, if you can assure me that there is really no danger. I am naturally timid, you know."

Patty was in some doubt as to how to take this reply of Fox's; not in much doubt, however. She laughed, too. "Are you, indeed?" she asked. "It is considered quite safe, I do assure you."

Mrs. Ladue looked very merry, but Patty did not see her.

"We will consider it settled, then," Patty concluded, with evident satisfaction.

On her way to her room, half an hour later, Mrs. Ladue met Patty on the stairs.

"Sarah," said Patty graciously, "I find Doctor Sanderson very agreeable and entertaining; much more so than I had any idea."

Mrs. Ladue was outwardly as calm as usual, but inwardly she felt a great resentment.

"I am glad, Patty," she replied simply; and she escaped to her room, where she found Sally and Henrietta.

"Sally," she said abruptly, "what do you think? Patty has asked Fox to go with us to see the racing to-morrow afternoon. I don't know who the 'us' is. She didn't say."

Sally stared and broke into chuckling. "Oh, _mother_!" she cried.